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From the very first scenes of this film I was incaptivated. It creates its own little world for the viewer to associate with and jump right into, which is the point of making any film. The film starts off slow and then appropriately builds up to an “epic” brimstone and fire ending that falls right line with the Stephen King short story mantra. You find yourself asking, can he really be doing this; the more unimaginable, the better.

In reviews I have read, critics feel the need to compare this work up against films like Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining (1980) and Misery. I feel that is an unfair fight and one that quite honestly should not even be waged. This film is in a totally different arena than those. This film I would like to think of as a guilty pleasure. It’s a fun ride. I do not think that its intention is to F with your mind and leave you jumbled, like The Shining does, oh and it does it well.

At the end I found myself thinking and asking questions. Unlike Misery and The Shining, which both neatly gift wrapped the resolution for you, leaving very little to take away and ponder over on the ride home.

The characters were great for this film. Both John Cusack and Samuel L. Jackson fit their role perfectly. First off, Jackson played the minor character role with grace. He knew his role and did not overexert himself to become overwhelming in the plot of the film. That is a mark of a great actor. He knew exactly what he had to do in order to be effective for the story line, and did nothing more.

Then we have Cusack, who in true Identity style plays the role of a “fish out of water” amazingly. He is an average Joe trying to get rich quick (cheesy haunted location guides) who has long put off the days of writing, when his writing contained substance and effort (the road/path chosen book). He is our hero and unlike Jack Nicholson’s character in The Shining, we want him to be triumphant and conquer the cleverly placed obstacles in his path, no matter how elaborate they are. The audience is truly emotionally engaged with this character, on the surface and even deeper (the loss of his daughter and having to deal with that).

To touch on the loss of his child for a second, this is one of the only times in the film, near the end, where Cusack gets a break from the traumatic events that surround him. This leads me to believe that a compulsory element to this film is the need to deal with the unattended issues of the past. Perhaps it took a flood, earthquake and fire to open the eyes of our hero here. For myself at least, my eyes were opened wide to the wide and increasingly intense array of complications Cusack had to put up with, and in true “hero” style Cusack arose to the occasion. The ending was cliché’, given, where tape recorder recounted the truths he discovered, but therein lies the mind screw that will leave you wondering.

But the element to the film that I liked the most was the subtleness. The director was great with using very subtle things in order to create tension and build suspense. He did not rush it or overly exert the plot in a way that would make the film feel like a shock and awe type of horror/suspense film. I definitely would not classify this in the horror genre by any means. It was a suspense thriller I believe. Subtleness was key here and little details in this film made it seem more authentic and realistic in my opinion.

(viewed in 2009)
Rating: 7/10